Burner apparatus



Nov. 25; 1958 w. H. DAILEY, JR

.BURNER APPARATUS Filed Oct.'9, 1952 I INVENTOR: I/VH BAILEY; JR. BY

ewo/ BURNER APPARATUS William H. Dailey, -Jr., Toledo, Ohio, assignor to Surface Comililustion Corporation, Toledo, Ohio, a corporation of i0 Application'October 9, 1952, Serial No. 313,968

Claims. (Cl. 158-109) This invention relates to burner apparatus for burning various fuelsin a direct fired furnace chamber such as a soaking pit. It has long been a problem in burning both slow burning and fast burning fuels in the same apparatus to provide for similar flame characteristics, such as flame travel and heat release distance, regardless of the character of the fuel burned.

Generally speaking, the burner port size determines the distance the combustion gases will travel when burning a certain quantity of a given fuel, the initial momentum of the air stream being the predominant factor in determining the actual fiame length. There is, however, another factor to be considered. The rate of burning of a given fuel in a given air stream will determine the average distance from the burner port at which heat is generated and released 'to the furnace chamber. In some improperly .designed or adjustedburner installations the fuel 'is still burning and generatingheat as it leaves the combustion chamber, thus releasingheat outside the'furnace chamber which is generally lost, or-in-recuperative installations will overheat recuperators .and, if therecuperators are metallic, will oxidize. them'too rapidly. This invention provides a relatively simple and efiective solution to these difficulties, providing a simple means for controlling the heat release distancefor a givenifuelin a' burner independently of total momentum. of the air stream, hence'total flame travel in thecombustion chamher.

For a consideration of what I believe to be novel and my invention, attention is directed to the followingportion of this specification and the drawing and concluding claims-thereof.

In the-drawingz Fig. l is a partial. sectional view of aburnerembodying this invention.

,fractory lined hot air duct 10 adapted to receive preheated air. for combustion and deliver it through an air pl'enumbox '11 to a burner port in a cast ceramic-block 12 formingipart of'a refractory lined furnace wall 13. Fuel gas isadded to the air stream by four fuel pipes 14 which are secured to each other at their terminal ends by. spacer blocks15, and are supported centrally by air vanes '16 in an alloyiventuri-shaped air inlet 17. Fuel gas is supplied to the four 'pipes 14 by a plenum box 21 which in turn receives fuel through a flanged inlet 22. The

burner as described thus faris more or less a nozzle mix United States Patent 0 2,861,529 Patented Nov. 25, 1&5?

, the initial axial momentum of the burning stream, hence will determine the distance the burning gases will travel as an integral stream before the initial axial velocity is expended and the gases admixed. into the general atmosphere of the furnace chamber formed by wall 13.

In burning such large volumes of fuel gas as is necessary in soaking pit installations, it is undesirable to form a mixture of air and fuel prior to entry into the burner port because, for example, at low firing rates and with air preheated to about 1000 F. the danger of backfire into the burner structure is great. The same acceleration of combustion in.a nozzle mixing burner .as is provided by premix is obtained by inserting intothe several gas pipes spinners 23 which are generally arranged in pairs to provide both clockwise and counter-clockwise spin in various gas streams, the net. result of which is to produce great turbulence between the gas stream and the core of the air stream, but with no residual, or resultant, spin in the combustion gas stream as a whole. By definition no residual spin in an admixture-stream emitted from a single burner wherein a plurality of rotating fuel streams are employed is the condition obtainedby balancing themomentum of spin of the clockwise-rotating fuel streams within said burner with the momentum of spin of the counterclockwise rotating fuel streams within the same said burner. It will be :readily apparent that-in such an admixture stream'amornentum of spin of sufiicient magnitude ofa single rotating fuel stream within a burner can be made to balance any remaining and counteraotating fuel streams within the same burner.

Eachspinner 23 comprises a central rod 25 extending from the terminalend of a tube through the gas plenum box 21, and an axial-adjustment of the rod is provided by element 24 through which the rod 25 extends. -A lock nut 26 is provided to fix the axial position of the rod in the tube 14.

Each rod 25 is provided with a circular series of vanes 26 for spinning the air .upon discharge from the pipe. To obtain maximum spinning energy inthe gas with a minimum of frictional losses and a minimum of manufacturing cost, each vane is "made from a plane curve which changes the direction of gasfiow at-a uniform rate and with no twist applied to the-gas flow. The individual vanes-may be formed from a cylindrical sur face or a surface of a cone, thus havingno compound ,curves; Thus it appears that as the gas initially strikes fuel gas with a minimum of frictional losses on the vanes at a gas discharge angle of about 45 tothe flow axis.

The turbulence produced .by the turning vanes on the several spinners may be varied by axial adjustment .of

the spinners in the tubes, withdrawing them "substantially 'into the tubes serving to reduce the spin ofgas leaving an individual tube. Several alternate fuels may thus be accommodated by the burner through axial adjustment ofthe spinners, and produce substantially the same heating performance by delivering similar characteristic heat distribution alongthe flame travel in the furnace.

By properly adjusting thesespinners, it is possible to regulate the moment of spin emerging from a single tube to balance the moments of spin emerging from the remaining tubes, where the gas in one or more of such remaining tubes rotates in an opposite direction,

By utilizing gas pipes with counter-rotating spinners in pairs, turbulence at the points of gas and air contact can be varied over a wide range without resulting in a total, or residual, spin in the flame.

When burning such low Btu gases as blast furnace gas,

it is desirable to accelerate combustion at high firing rates and to accelerate mixing of preheated air and cold fuel gas before they tend to stratify in the furnace. Turbulence as produced by these counter-rotating spinners accomplishes these beneficial results, and if the gas pipes are grouped four to a burner with the spin as indicated in Fig. 7, then at low rates of fuel flow the fuel tends to spread out fanwise to flatten out the flame. At higher rates of fuel flow the greater turbulence and accelerated combustion tend to hide this characteristic, producing the desired relatively shorter flame which is necessary to obtain proper release of heat in the furnace chamber.

I claim:

1. The method of producing a relatively wide and thin stream of burning fuel from a burner port, which comprises delivering an axially flowing stream of air through and substantially uniformly distributed over said burner port, delivering four substantially parallel streams of fuel to said burner' port in a substantially square pattern cluster of streams, and imparting to a diagonally opposed pair of streams a clockwise spin and to the other diagonally'opposed pair of streams a counter-clockwise spin, whereby the resultant gas stream becomes relatively wide in one direction and relatively thin in the other direction.

2. Burner apparatus comprising, in combination: wall means forming a burner port for delivering gas fuel and air to a combustion chamber; a cluster of four fuel conduits arranged in a square pattern to discharge four streams of fuel through said burner port; air conduit means for delivering a substantially uniformly distributed, axially flowing stream of air through said port and about said fuel conduits; and spinner means in each of said fuel conduits for imparting spin to each of said four streams of fuel, said spinner means producing opposite rotational spin in the adjacent fuel streams defining a side of the square pattern.

3. Apparatus according to claim 2 and comprising means for axially adjusting the spinner means in said fuel conduits whereby to adjust the degree of rotational spin in the respective discharging fuel streams.

4. In a burner of the class wherein fuel to be burned and air for combustion are delivered in individual, substantially parallel streams to a burner port, the method of delivering said stream which comprises: delivering air in an axially flowing stream which is substantially uni-' formly distributed over said port; delivering fuel in a cluster of four streams, the axis of each fuel stream being parallel with the air stream axis and the fuel stream axes passing through a plane perpendicular to said axes in a manner such that the intersection of the fuel axes with said plane define the corners of a parallelogram; imparting to two of the fuel streams clockwise spin and to the other two fuel streams counterclockwise spin and adjusting the magnitude of spin in each of said fuel streams in a manner that the magnitude sum of the clockwise rotational spins balances the magnitude sum of the counterclockwise spins to produce substantially no residual spin in the admixture emitted from said burner port.

5. The method of producing a stream of burning fuel, with no residual spin, from a burner port which comprises: delivering an axially flowing stream of air through, and substantially uniformly distributed over, the burner port; delivering four streams of fuel to the burner port, the axis of each fuel stream being parallel with the air stream axis, and fuel stream axes passing through a 4 plane perpendicular to said axes in a manner such that the intersection of the fuel stream axes with said plane define the corners of a parallelogram; imparting to a diagonally opposed pair of streams a clockwise spin and to the other diagonally opposed pair of streams a counterclockwise spin and adjusting the magnitude of spin in each of said fuel streams in a manner that the magnitude sum of the clockwise rotational spins balances the magnitude sum of the counterclockwise spins to produce substantially no residual spin in the admixture emitted from said burner port.

6. Burner apparatus comprising, in combination: wall means forming a burner port for delivering gas fuel and air to a combustion chamber; a plurality of fuel conduits arranged to discharge a plurality of fuel streams through said port; conduit means for delivering a substantially uniformly distributed, axially flowing stream of air through said port and about said conduits; spinner means in at least two of said conduits for imparting spin to each of said streams of fuel therefrom, said spin in at least one of said fuel streams being clockwise and in at least one of said other streams being counterclockwise; and means for axially adjusting said spinner means in said conduit to adjust the degree of rotational spin in the respective fuel streams in a manner whereby the resultant gas stream has substantially no residual spin.

7. In a burner of the class wherein fuel and air for combustion are delivered in individual, substantially parallel streams to a burner port, the method of delivering said streams which comprises: delivering the air in an axially flowing stream which is substantially uniformly distributed over said port; delivering fuel in a plurality of streams through said burner port, the axis of each fuel stream being parallel with the air stream axis; imparting: to at least one of the fuel streams clockwise spin and to at least one of the fuel streams counterclockwise spin and? adjusting the magnitude of spin in each of said fuel streams in a manner that the magnitude sum of the clock wise rotational spins balances the magnitude sum of thecounterclockwise spins to produce substantially no resid-- ual spin in the admixture emitted from said burner port.

8. Burner apparatus comprising, in combination: wall means forming a burner port for delivering an admixture of fuel and air to a combustion chamber; a plurality of fuel conduits arranged in a pattern to deliver a plurality of fuel streams through said burner port; air conduit means for delivering a substantially uniformly distributed, axially flowing stream of air about said conduits and through said burner port; spinner means in each of said fuel conduits for imparting rotational spin to each of said fuel streams, at least one of said spinner means arranged to impart a clockwise spin and at least one of said spinner means arranged to impart a counterclockwise spin; and individual adjustment means for each of said spinner means for adjusting the magnitude of spin from each of said fuel streams in a manner that the magnitude sum of the clockwise rotational spins balances the magnitude.

sum of the counterclockwise rotational spins to produce substantially no residual spin in the admixture emitted from said burner port.

9. Burner apparatus comprising, in combination: wall means forming a burner port for delivering an admixture of fuel and air to a combustion chamber; a cluster of four fuel conduits having equal capacities arranged in a square pattern to discharge four streams of fuel of equal quantity through said burner port; conduit means for delivering a substantially uniformly distributed, axially flowing stream of air through said port and about said conduits; and spinner means in each of said conduits for imparting equal rotational spin to each of said four streams of fuel, two of said spinner means producing clockwise rotational spin and two of said spinner means producing counterclockwise rotational spin, the components of the clockwise spins being balanced by the components of the counterclockwise spins in a manner that pro- 5 duces no residual spin in the admixture from said burner port.

10. Burner apparatus comprising, in combination: wall means forming a burner port for delivering an admixture of fuel and air to a combustion chamber; a plurality of fuel conduits arranged in a pattern to deliver a plurality of fuel streams through said burner port; air conduit means for delivering a substantially uniformly distributed, axially flowing stream of air about said conduits and through said burner port; spinner means in each of said fuel conduits for imparting rotational spin to each of said fuel streams, at least one of said spinner means arranged to impart a clockwise spin and at least one of said spinner means arranged to impart a counterclockwise spin; and individual support means for each of said spinner means coaxial with its fuel conduit arranged to be adjustable along the longitudinal axis of said fuel conduit and position said spinner means in respect to the end of said fuel conduit thereby effecting the magnitude of rotational spin from said fuel conduit, the clockwise spinner means being positioned from their respective fuel conduit ends to discharge a clockwise spin magnitude that balances the counterclockwise spin magnitude of the remaining counterclockwise spinner means thereby producing no residual spin in the admixture emitted from said burner port.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 516,107 Pemberton Mar. 6, 1894 1,508,718 Peabody Sept. 16, 1924 1,721,381 Ellis July 16, 1929 1,943,286 Burg Jan. 16, 1934 2,241,611 Mulholland May 13, 1941 2,310,454 Mulholland Feb. 9, 1943 2,335,188 Kennedy Nov. 23, 1943 2,391,447 Edge Dec. 25, 1945 2,755,750 Escher July 24, 1956 

